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POLITICS: UN Summit of World Leaders Under Heavy Fire

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 14 2005 (IPS) - The U.N. summit meeting of some 175 world leaders opened Wednesday with predictable political hoopla – and a thunderous bang.

The political fireworks did not come from heads of government or heads of state present at the gathering, but were set off mostly by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and international relief agencies clobbering the world body.

Virtually every single NGO, most of them dedicated to monitoring the United Nations, tore apart the 35-page outcome document to be adopted by world leaders on Friday.

The summit, they warned, will turn out to be a “damp squib” because it will fall far short of expectations.

“The summit cannot be salvaged,” Jim Paul, executive director of the New York-based Global Policy Forum told IPS. “The text (of the outcome document) is a bummer.”

He said the document, which was meant to spell out a political and economic agenda for the 21st century, as originally envisioned by Secretary-General Kofi Annan, is “weak and full of platitudes and generalities.”

“Generally, it seems a step backward from the Millennium Summit of 2000” which adopted the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), including halving extreme poverty and hunger and reversing the spread of AIDS and malaria. The target date to achieve those goals was 2015.

Nicola Reindorp, head of Oxfam International, was equally critical of the action plan to be adopted on Friday. “With the exception of agreeing to stop future genocides, world leaders should be embarrassed to sign it,” she said.

“We wanted a bold agenda to tackle poverty, but instead we have a brochure showcasing past commitments,” Reindorp told IPS.

She said “there is very little to celebrate” in the latest summit outcome document, which was approved by the General Assembly on Tuesday after several all-night marathon sessions, and will be finally endorsed by world leaders.

“The one area where governments look set to show that they are able to act boldly is on their responsibility to protect civilians (in war zones),” she added. “On the fight against poverty, the summit is in danger of falling before it has begun.”

Neil Watkins, national coordinator Jubilee USA Network, said that “as the summit is underway, it is clear that world leaders are failing to provide the bold leadership needed to address the crisis of global poverty”.

“This is unacceptable. Rather than backtracking, what is needed is much bolder steps,” he said. Watkins also pointed out that world leaders must embrace and go well beyond the commitments made by the Group of Eight (G8) industrialised countries (the United States, Britain, Germany, Italy, France, Canada, Japan and Russia) last July if the MDGs are to be met.

The pledges made by the G8 included a commitment to provide 50 billion dollars a year in aid to fight poverty by 2010.

Watkins said that a recent study found at least 62 low-income nations would require full debt cancellation – in addition to more aid and trade justice – as a first step towards achieving MDGs. But there is going to be no such commitment by world leaders here, he added.

“Leaders have dashed hopes and squandered opportunities,” said Kumi Naidoo of the Global Call to Action Against Poverty. “And empty promises cost lives.” He said that millions of campaigners around the world have expressed “disappointment and dismay” at the U.N. summit.

At a press conference Tuesday, Annan did not fail to put his own positive spin on the much-laboured outcome document.

“Obviously, we didn’t get everything we wanted,” he told reporters, “but with 191 member states, it’s not easy to get an agreement.”

While praising member states for approving his two proposals to create a new Human Rights Council and a Peacebuilding Commission, Annan was forced to admit that one of the major drawbacks of the document was in disarmament and non-proliferation.

“The big item missing is (nuclear) non-proliferation and (nuclear) disarmament. This is a real disgrace,” he said. Annan was also disappointed that his proposal for a radical restructuring of the world body was shot down by member states who feared that he was trying to usurp the powers of the 191-member General Assembly, the highest policy making body at the United Nations.

As some political observers point out, Annan’s plans to link the poverty alleviation agenda with peace, security and human rights were far too ambitious.

“Annan was trying to leave behind a legacy of revitalising the United Nations for the 21st century. But while trying to do all of them at the same time, he obviously failed,” an Asian diplomat told IPS.

Bill Pace, executive director of the World Federalist Movement, said that it was a “gamble” to link development, security, peace and human rights reform. And it did not prove successful, he added.

The main U.N. reform crisis was not in management but in decision-making. He criticised the closed-door consensus-based negotiations (which resulted in the final outcome document) where a few governments were allowed to exercise a veto over the will of the overwhelming majority of member states.

He said that even if governments do not use voting to make decisions, they should use voting as “soundings” to determine whether governments are actually undermining negotiations. “The United Nations needs more democracy,” Pace concluded.

He said the five permanent members of the Security Council, namely the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia, behave in the General Assembly as if they have veto rights and fiercely refuse to allow any consideration of peace and security issues.. And a few others, mostly military governments or permanent member wannabes, wreck the negotiations from the other side.

When the outcome document is put to a vote before world leaders late Friday, at least one delegation may abstain.

Just after the General Assembly adopted the document on Tuesday, the delegate from Venezuela said that he was “surprised” and “astonished” that the document had been provided only in English and at the last minute.

The final decision on the document, he pointed out, was taken by a core group of about 15 countries, not the 191 members of the world body.

“It was impossible to approve such an important text in that manner. Such a process ran counter to the very principles of the Organisation,” he added.

On Wednesday, the New York Times squarely blamed the United States – and specifically its “notoriously undiplomatic” Ambassador John Bolton – for the impending failure of the summit.

The Times accused Bolton of insisting on a very long list of unilateral demands. “The predictable effect was to transform what had been a painful and difficult search for workable diplomatic compromises into a competitive exercise in political posturing.”

As a result, said the Times editorial, the most tragic loss is a genuine opportunity to help the one billion people around the world who each live on less than a dollar a day.